Windows Xp Installation Guide Step by Step

Before you start, you must have your Windows XP installation CD and the product key available.

If you cannot find your Windows XP CD or you cannot contact your computer manufacturer, you may have to purchase a new copy of Windows XP. Visit following link for more information:
here



Step 1 - Start your PC and place your Windows XP CD in your CD/DVD-ROM drive. Your PC should automatically detect the CD and you will get a message saying "Press any key to boot from CD". Soon as computer starts booting from the CD your will get the following screen:

Step 2 - At this stage it will ask you to press F6 if you want to install a third party Raid or SCSI driver. If you are using a an IDE Hard Drive then you do not need to press F6. If you are using a SCSI or SATA Hard drive then you must press F6 otherwise Windows will not detect your Hard Drive during the installation. Please make sure you have the Raid drivers on a floppy disk. Normally the drivers are supplied on a CD which you can copy to a floppy disk ready to be installed. If you are not sure how to do this then please read your motherboard manuals for more information.

Step 3 - You will then get a Windows XP Professional Setup screen. You have the option to do a new Windows install, Repair previous install or quit. Since we are doing a new install we just press Enter to continue.

Step 4 - You will be presented with the End User Licensing Agreement. Press F8 to accept and continue




Step 5 - This step is very important. Here we will create the partition where Windows will be installed. If you have a brand new unformatted drive you will get a screen similar to below. In our case the drive size is 5000MB. We can choose to install Windows in this drive without creating a partition, hence use the entire size of the drive. If you wish to do this you can just press enter and Windows will automatically partition and format the drive as one large drive.


Press C to create a partition.

Step 6 - Windows will show the total size of the hard drive and ask you how much you want to allocate for the partition you are about to create. I will choose 5000MB. You will then get the screen below.



Step 7 - Press Enter to start the installation or Delete to remove partition.


Select Partition 1 (C: Drive) and press Enter.

Step 8 - Choose format the partition using NTFS file system.This is the recommended file system. If the hard drive has been formatted before then you can choose quick NTFS format. We chose NTFS because it offers many security features, supports larger drive size, and bigger size files.

Windows will now start formatting drive C: and start copying setup files as shown like images below :

Step 9 - After the setup has completed copying the files the computer will restart. Leave the XP CD in the drive but this time DO NOT press any key when the message "Press any key to boot from CD" is displayed. In few seconds setup will continue. Windows XP Setup wizard will guide you through the setup process of gathering information about your computer.

Step 10 - Choose your region and language.


Step 11 - Type in your name and organization.


 Step 12. Enter your product key.


Step 13 - Type the computer name, and enter an Administrator password. Don't forget to write down your Administrator password.

Step 14 - Enter the correct date, time and choose your time zone.



Step 15 - For the network setting choose typical and press next.



Step 16 - Choose workgroup or domain name. If you are not a member of a domain then leave the default settings and press next. Windows will restart again and adjust the display.



Step 17 - Finally Windows will start and present you with a Welcome screen. Click next to continue.

Step 18 - Choose 'help protect my PC by turning on automatic updates now' and press next.

Step 19 - And here you just click Next, Skip and Finish and Log in to your PC for the first time.



Step 20 - After finishing your installation and than install Drivers your PC ( Sound, VGA Card, etc )

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